Reviews

Dante's Inferno by Dante Alighieri

smoores415's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

Honestly this book is impossible to give a rating to, because while it was very difficult to understand, took me a while to get through, and incredibly dry, I am happy to have read the book to understand certain references and see Dante's imagination. I also don't agree with certain people being put in Hell (Helen of Troy and Cleopatra) or certain sins being punishable in such extreme ways. To me, there were way too many references to people living at the time and too many things that had to do with Dante personally for it to be a great classic. In my opinion, he should have worked harder to not put so many of his personal opinions or talk about his political stance and I could see it being more timeless.

juligestoeber's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated

3.0

Notes and knowledge on Dante's life are needed to really appreciate his words

hal3yj0's review against another edition

3.0

mfw the centuries old italian poetry is challenging to read:

grvhppr's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

asjublieft's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

sidharthvardhan's review against another edition

4.0

“Through me the way is to the city dolent;
Through me the way is to eternal dole;
Through me the way among the people lost.
Justice incited my sublime Creator;
Created me divine Omnipotence,
The highest Wisdom and the primal Love.
Before me there were no created things,
Only eterne, and I eternal last.
“All hope abandon, ye who enter in!”

One of the death rites among Hindus is performance of a reading of ‘Garuda Purana’ during the mourning period- a book that like Inferno lists punishments given to sinners. The thing has its moments – my favorite, without exception, is this Vetarni river in which the soul is left to suffer for a while before being permitted to enter the Hell. Now you can bunk this punishment by, you know, gifting away a cow to a Brahmin or, if you missed the offer, your son can do it for you after your death. If that was done, you could just cross the river by holding on to that cow’s tail.

Yeah, don’t laugh, it is supposed to be religious!

Whatever else you may say about these religious people, they did have their imagination when it comes to coming up with sadist punishments.

Now, Dante is not a very likable fellow. And he probably won't like us either. If ever he was to meet us, the chances are he would be guessing which circles we will make it to ... I mean, I don't like that kind of talk, Dante may as well go to hell with it.... okay, I heard you.

Actually I later joined the game - guessing which circle I shall be in because, let us face it, we are all sinners here. Your very own pious friend here made it to at least three circles.

You can also make guesses about people you don't like, which is basically what Dante is doing most of the time - often going ‘Tch! Tch! You sinners!’ in his religious revenge on his enemies from Florentine, from where he was exiled for political reasons.

“Rejoice , O Florence, since thou art so great,
That over sea and land thou beatest thy wings,
And throughout Hell thy name is spread abroad!”

I guess the city had something in it which inspired this sort of crooked genius. About two centuries later, Machiavelli will write another great work to get even with Florentine government.

Back to Dante, what is still most dis-likable about him is his Devil-will-take-care attitude towards non-Christians. Prophet Mohammad is punished in last circle as Schismatic. It is worst still as at least some of this Comedy might have been inspired indirectly by Mohammad’s and early Islamic ideas.

In First circle are punished although only mildly, people who weren't Christian or before Christ Jew, including some of Dante’s favorites. The punishment is ‘without hope we live on in desire’ – Sounds like Monday morning, right? There are a number of beautiful quotes in there.

Another set of sinners who get Dante’s sympathy are those who had committed sins of sensuality. Herein are the only pairs of sinners who are not alone in hell – lovers, holding on to each-other even in hell - Not surprisingly, since it is Dante’s crush, Beatrice who sent his idol, Vigil’s soul over to guide him on divine ways and to act as his holy cow ticket.

I don’t know why people don’t mention her in their reviews – except for his poetry, his crush is about the only good thing you can say about him and it was for some time as famous as his poetry. He wrote odes to her (and not to his wife). His daughter took her name when she became nun. In fact, if you open the page on ‘Unrequited Love’on Wikipedia, you shall find a painting, one of my favorites, of him (no kidding) looking longingly at her while she walks on oblivious, conversing with her friends.

Spoiler

And oh! if you have read Brown's inferior namesake, you will notice that each of three - Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso end with same word 'stars'.

anders_holbaek's review against another edition

5.0

"In that season of the youthful year
when the sun cools his locks beneath Aquarius
and the dark already nears but half the day.

and when the hoarfrost copies out upon the fields
the very image of her snowy sister -
although her pen-point is not sharp for long -

the peasant, short of fodder, rises,
looks out, and sees the countryside
turned white, at which he slaps his thigh,

goes back indoors, grumbling here and there
like a wretch who knows not what to do,
then goes outside again and is restored to hope,

seeing that the world has changed its face
in that brief time, and now picks up his crook
and drives his sheep to pasture."

laylaaxr's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

linneak2002's review against another edition

I was intimidated by this book because I have heard how hard it is to read. I loved it! It was very easy to read, and it gives one a lot to think about. I also took the free online class about this from Hillsdale College, and I highly recommend that as well.

eesh25's review against another edition

I'm going to say this up front: This is not a review. More like me writing what I thought about the epic, because I have not idea how to review a Fourteenth century epic about a dude's journey through the nine circles of hell. Moving on.

Dante was obviously a very good poet and had an imagination that would put Spongebob to shame. Seriously, the guy did a really good job at thinking up different tortures related to different sins and his imagery was epic (pun!). If I ever need to learn how to magically torture someone, I would use Inferno as a guide book.

But, while he is a skilled writer, I also agree with the reviewer who called this a "burn book". Because Dante essentially put every person he didn't like in hell. Actually, he put everyone in hell. Every single Greek or Roman hero or leader I've ever heard of was in there. He set very strict rules and I'm not sure how anyone is ever supposed to make it to heaven.

And this book was not easy to get through. The traslation I read was good and simple but it the bajillion references that had me in a bit of a pickle. He referenced so many people and events that, had I tried to look up each and every one, I would've been reading this for a month.

Also, Dante was a genius but this wasn't something that you could agree with. And maybe he didn't intend for his work to be a lesson; Just a demonstration of talant.

Whatever the case. I did like reading this poem but it was a strange experience. I might come back to it at some point in the future. Give it another shot. For now, I'm going to leave the rating black. Reading at your own risk.